Extract from Thomas Jefferson’sNotes on the State of Virginia

Is uniformity of opinion desirable? No more than face or stature ... Is uniformity
attainable? Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction
of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned; yet we have not advance
one inch towards uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half
the world fools, and the other half hypocrites. To support roguery and error all over
the earth.